


Harmless Mischief

by mayamaia



Category: Man From U.N.C.L.E.
Genre: M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-23
Updated: 2012-10-23
Packaged: 2017-11-16 21:49:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,566
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/544191
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mayamaia/pseuds/mayamaia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"When Mimi was pulling on her stockings, who could you possibly have been acting for?"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Harmless Mischief

**Author's Note:**

> For the scrapbook's Halloween Challenge 2012, svetlanacat requested a "rather slashy" story to go with this picture:  
>    
> 
> 
> Thanks to my betas: kleenexwoman, Teacup and Lia

Illya began without preamble as they left Waverly's office.

"I should like to think better of you, Napoleon."

Solo glanced at his partner before replying, "In case you didn't notice, I wasn't entirely successful."

Illya strode off down the corridor, so that Napoleon had to maintain a similarly brisk rate in order to keep pace with him.  "While I am amused at Miss Doolittle exercising her adventurous nature in her newest area of expertise, I am not concerned about her interests in this." He scowled.  "It is rather your own need to stake some form of animalistic claim that concerns me."

"Again, Illya, I point out that I failed."

Without breaking stride, Kuryakin treated Solo to a withering look.  "You should not have needed to try.  These games are childish.  I am your partner, Napoleon, not a threat to you.  And yet you need to prove your masculinity by posturing, pulling the girl away, ogling her while she undresses, playing caveman in the corner..."

"Hey, most of that was part of the plan."

"Staring at her while she removed her stockings? Enlighten me to the utility of that." Sarcasm oozed from Illya's voice.

"Hey, just because you can turn it off at will doesn't mean it's natural to be a cold fish. Hey, I know what our costumes should be at the party next week!" Solo added, a trifle too brightly.

"Deflection, Napoleon." Illya moved in front of him, forcing Solo to stop, and looked him in the eye.  His voice was softer when he continued, "The truth killed a man tonight.  You should perhaps not ignore it as you are so frequently given to."

Napoleon stilled at that.  Illya's words, stolen from his lips by an overpowered truth serum, had been used to destroy Steve Cantrell.  The man was right: it was no time to play games with speech, when Illya would be struggling not to assign false meaning to the traitorous echoes of his own remembered voice.  He could probably use something different to worry about.

Solo swallowed, and made a decision.  He grabbed his partner's arm, tugging him toward the exit.  When Illya began to object, he only said "In the car, not before."

By the time they reached the garage, Napoleon could tell Illya's mind was racing with possibilities.  Without revealing the topic of disclosure, Solo's sudden urgency must have revealed that it should be kept secret even within the halls of UNCLE.  The ramifications Illya might imagine could be unsavory at least.  So it would only be a mercy to get straight to the point, if only Napoleon could do so tactfully.

Solo dropped into his seat, while a now more reluctant Kuryakin eased in and shut his door with a slow click.  The engine roared to life as Illya wryly requested, "Please time your most dramatic revelation for when my heart attack and the ensuing car wreck shall not kill innocents." Napoleon found himself forced to chuckle and soberly agreed.

"I knew that you weren't particularly interested in Mimi," he began as they pulled out of the garage.  "Keeping her from you would have been no great trial."

"And still your need to make it a competition."

"Yes," Solo cautiously answered,  "Need is the word for it.  Not that your performance wouldn't have been exemplary, but it would still have been a performance.  Will be."

"Perhaps," Illya allowed, "but I can enjoy the role even should I not especially enjoy the company.  And I am certain I shall enjoy the dinner, if only you do not convince her to forget her engagement with me after she has enjoyed your own."

"Ah yes, I should never stand between you and your appetite." They came to a stop light and Napoleon spoke in a rush.  "I knew you didn't actually want to kiss her for the same reason I knew my advice wouldn't make any difference with the truth serum.  But I couldn't exactly tell you to think of boys in front of THRUSH."

Illya stared at him until a car honked behind them, jolting him alert as the other driver's verbal abuse faintly drifted into the car through the window glass.  Illya pulled over at the first opportunity and spoke quietly.  "I presume by the manner and circumstances in which you brought this up both that you are very certain and that you do not intend to use your information for my harm."

"I am and I won't." Illya nodded and Napoleon continued, "I just want to look out for my best friend."

"And you perceive him as a threat to your image?" Illya gave him a troubled look and added, "To return to the topic of your lecherous behavior."

"Ah, no," Solo answered, "I see my image as a screen against threats to him.  And to me.  I may lay it on thick when I'm worried about you."

"I see," Illya said, and then reversed it, "Actually I don't.  How are you so certain about this anyway?"

Napoleon cleared his throat. "One of your liaisons, while otherwise discreet, bemoaned to a former lover the difficulty of pinning down the Golden Russian for future encounters."

"And that former lover was himself indiscreet."

"No, he's been quiet about it up until this evening." Napoleon answered his partner's blink with a tight smile and a short wave. "Bob was a good buddy, too. We kept in touch."

Illya blinked again, then turned back to the steering wheel with his eyes unfocused, gripping the leather as if to steer them into a simpler conversation.  In front of the car, a small group of boys in costume a week early laughed their way swiftly down the street, distorted masks awry, one clutching an egg carton.  They were followed by a portly shopkeeper, redfaced, yolk drying in his hair, and too out of breath to shout the curses dancing on his tongue.  Illya's eyes narrowed, and he asked, "Why is it that American television glorifies juvenile mischief makers?  It can only make life harder for the adults who tend them."

Nonplussed by the change of topic, Solo answered automatically, "It's more innocent than being good.  A child who is good is being what he's told to be, but a child who makes a little harmless mischief is being himself.  Never trust a man who seems to be totally good, it's all going to be on the surface."

"You were listening to Waverly and Marton."

"Now there's a happy couple if ever there was one."

Illya whipped his head around to stare at his partner, his face a mask of shock.  Napoleon's answering grin might as well have been a crow of triumph.  "I am never going to be able to scrub that image from my memory," Illya growled with a shake of his head. "You are _terrible_ , Napoleon."

"And yet, you trust me."

Illya gave a short, startled laugh.  "And so does everybody else! Your idea may not be as flimsy as it seems." They exchanged smiles, and Illya started the car again.

They had almost reached the apartment when Illya spoke up again.  "Should I take it from your wording that your experience with Bob was less ephemeral than your encounters with females?"

Napoleon cleared his throat.  "Ah, my experience with Bob was in Korea.  It might well have been ephemeral otherwise."

"So you cannot place all the blame for your crude behavior on keeping up your image."

"No," he coughed awkwardly, "After my wife... I don't wish to hold anyone to an unreasonable standard." Solo's eyes remained firmly directed away from his partner. "Still, I can place most of it there.  The more attention they pay to my antics, the safer you are.  And me."

Illya shot a glance over at his partner before turning in to the garage beneath their apartment building.  "I have my doubts about your theory.  Even should it be correct, I don't think you weigh the consequences of your antics properly.  They have gotten me _into_ more trouble than out." He pulled into a space and shut off the engine.

"Some kinds of trouble can be fixed but some linger."

"Perhaps." Illya wondered if Napoleon was deflecting again.  "I will grant that your caveman impression did get us out of trouble tonight."

"Caveman in the corner.  That is going to be a perfect costume for the party, Mr. Fish."

"Where you will obtain yet another ephemeral encounter, and let them think your soul sits on the surface." Illya pinned Napoleon with a look.  "When Mimi was pulling off her stockings, who could you possibly have been acting for?" He opened the door and surged out of the car.

Napoleon sighed and followed.

Silence in the elevator, a murmured good night at Illya's floor.  Solo's shoes rustling against the carpet in the hall, the click of his key in the lock.  Soft beeping of the security system until he reset it, the chink of glass and susurration of gently poured fluid.  A creak and a sigh as he eased into a chair.

 _The truth is a killer tonight,_ Napoleon thought as he took a sip and swirled it in his mouth.  Who could he have been acting for, indeed?  He shifted and resettled in the chair. _"I may lay it on thick when I'm worried about you."_  Over and over he heard himself say it, the treacherous echoes of memory.


End file.
